There Is Only You
by Urchin of the Riding Stars
Summary: He had snow, but all he ever wanted was the warm rain that was forever laughing its way past his clutching fingertips. Looking back on it, Russia decides that his decision was a long way coming. Rusame. Fiction written for the lovely Nenema and her illustrated story on DeviantArt.


**Hey everyone! Check out Nenema's deviantart profile if you love you some awesome and tearjerking scenes of Ivan and Alfred! Really hope you enjoy, and thank you Nenema for giving me the okay to write this tribute!**

**Note: Don't own Hetalia, the plot of this story, or any poetry mentioned. **

* * *

~*oOo*~

_Day's rain is done. The rainy mist of night_

_Spreads on the sky, leaden apparel wearing,_

_And through the pine-trees, like a ghost appearing,_

_The moon comes up with hidden light._

_All in my soul drags me to dark surrender. –_Alexander Pushkin

~*oOo*~

He doesn't want to go back, doesn't want to return to his ruined house, which has slowly succumbed to gloom and neglect after the fall of the Soviet Union. There isn't even his manic little sister waiting for him there anymore; there is only Winter throwing itself against the cracked, dingy windowpanes, reminding Russia of the brutal, blood-freezing chill that is to come in just a short few weeks.

There is no one for whom Russia can expect to visit; there are none of his former subordinates which he dragged to his den in the hopes of staving off loneliness waiting for him. They were gone, all flown away, though Russia had tried to keep them safe and happy so that they could venture outside the cage and return to him.

_They couldn't even stay long enough to help him obtain his true prize. That was gratitude for you. _

He has no home, only a dwelling that he has come to dread, yet it swallows him completely for an enormous sum of the year. Because where else is there to go? It's certainly better to hide alone and pretend that he prefers his friendlessness rather than to try walking out and matching footsteps with strangers.

_Better that than to be reminded of the hopeless hope that kept dying and rekindling itself in the pits of his stomach, a furnace mostly kept off. _

Russia scarcely steps outside his own doorstop, though he's always at the World Conferences and G-8 meetings without fail. While the meetings might as well be a hoax, a fabrication made to assure their citizens that the world is at least making an attempt at playing nice, they certainly break up the monotony in the old country's existence.

_And make his bones ache as though General Winter was singing him a wintry lullaby, because **he's** there, surrounded by an impenetrable barrier of glass and shadows. _

The meeting is over.

The nations exchanged their usual complaints, insults, and heated banter, and as custom, got nothing accomplished. Everyone has slowly trickled away, leaving Russia alone in his seat. He's not certain how long he sits there, but before long he hears the wind start moaning softly outside and he winds up at the window, looking out past the swaying curtains.

He wonders vaguely how he wound up there; every limb feels like it's been anchored to the Earth. Being under the yoke of the Byzantine Empire was a similar feeling.

It's getting dark outside now; it looks like a storm is coming. Russia feels strangely faint, light enough to be felled by the wind rapping itself against the meeting room windows, sending auburn and bright red leaves twirling and scattering on the yellowing grass outside.

___They call this near-winter…bah!_ He thinks derisively. Even in cold, America is soft.

Thunder roars overhead, but Russia doesn't hasten to move outside in order to find some other shelter before the storm hits. Instead, Ivan leans his forehead against the cool glass, watching the only two other nations that had elected to stick around, talking underneath the great many trees proudly displaying their last firework finale before winter stripped them bare._  
_

Ivan's violet eyes narrow as he watches England make an affronted face at something America says and start fussing. Far from looking chastised, Alfred only chuckles and pats at the grumbling nation's arm appeasingly, his merry eyes sparkling with laughter.

The world trembles a lit bit underneath Russia, and he watches the two wander off together into the graying distance. His heart is throbbing rhythmically beneath his ribs, burning like an ember wrapped in paper, softly trying to burst through him.

He grits his teeth and tastes rust, hand pressed over his chest so that the wretched organ doesn't spring its way free.

If it weren't his duty to show up here…well, amusement or not, it was getting more and more terrible to see HIM, he who was so light and open and charismatic that hundreds gravitated towards him, that Ivan couldn't trap him in a jar and bring his warmth back to his home country. It was he who opened every world conference and G-8 meeting, although America had never been given a chairman or spokesperson position of any kind. He'd simply _made_ himself the leader, and others followed out of instinct, keen to be alongside the bright young superpower, to be _right_.

Or at the very least, if they later discovered they were wrong, they had a scapegoat on their hands.

The rain starts to fall, lightly at first, though a drizzle of pearl-like drops steadily turns into a downpour. Russia just stares at the water rushing down the window, blurring and distorting his view of America's home country. Ivan presses his free hand against the cool windowpane, swallowing past the enormous, extremely painful lump that had swollen in his throat.

_No one wants to be alone. _

What creature, from pining infant to old bird, wanted to be as solitary as Ivan?

_So how did I get here?_

No one can tell him. He has no one to ask.

* * *

There's no point in staying here.

But isn't any point in leaving, either.

He has memories of his beginnings like any other country would, but the lot of them is nearly entirely a mass of daily duties, typical exchanges, quiet, absentminded frets and daydreams; one white crystal after another. Russia knew that like snowflakes, they all likely differed from one another to some extent on closer examination, but for the most part, he preferred to leave his memories unexamined.

It's Russia's saving grace and mercy, the ability to keep his eyes locked on the future rather than wandering back to the past; the past being like an uneventful year which may or may not have lasted a very long time, monotony broken by outbreaks and blood. It isn't as though there's really very much to look at anyway-there's a great deal of cold, (always, **always** the cold) the goals almost always the same, (food, warmth, safety, government, duty) the flakes all invariably alike from a distance.

A mountain of gray snow-ashes. Ivan's face slowly begins to crumple, his eyes prickling even as they see an overflowing blue sky.

What broke that ceaseless pattern, unlikely or likely enough, was a young boy in England's household many, many years ago, the one who had been so _delighted_ to find Russia in military apparel standing transfixed in a field of little waving suns. He had cheerily offered the visiting country one of the blooms and had tugged him about his homeland, eager to show him fields where his rabbit friends could be found, where the best trees to climb and swing from were in the forest, to berry bushes bursting with ripe fruit and watering holes that were cool and deep under the bright, _hot_ sun.

He might have known subconsciously from the day he'd met the young nation, but now, staring out the window and watching the torrent, he is forced to admit to himself that America, gentle, heroic, cruel and brutal America, was invariably the most precious thing alive. He was warm sunlight, but sunlight did not race in people's veins the way water did, though he wouldn't have been surprised if he'd pulled America apart to find sunshine dancing on his heart.

America was the sun, the center of everything. And he was water, from which everything began.

_And no one ever realized it. No one but Russia, who could never, ever stand too close to him. It seemed there was always a barrier of shadows keeping the two at an even distance, perhaps worried that the snowman would somehow try and harm the most beautiful and dearly loved thing in the world. _

While Ivan marched through ghosts with his long boots, desperate to get at America, desperate to crush him to his heart and perhaps try to force the younger nation inside of it, the sea of ghosts just thickened, and the distance between the two widened exponentially until America-Alfred-America was a faint star at the very edge of his distance, and Ivan was always forced to stop grasping before the star vanished from sight, leaving him alone in the darkness.

Russia burned, burned inwardly when he watched him be surrounded by so many lucky souls. He was always able to see, but never get close. Cruelly tantalizing, like holding a pitcher of water out to a child dying of thirst and then tossing it out the wayside. Ever elusive, rain through fingertips, slip, slip, sliding away and leaving Russia only the faintest trace that anything had ever been there at all in his hot, calloused hands.

Had America been Russia's colony rather than England's, Ivan doesn't think that they-_**he**_-ever would have ever let go, regardless of how viciously America beat himself against the bars. His people are too stubborn, and he was always afraid of losing the beautiful things that came into his life, though he has a tendency to hold on too tightly to the few things he's ever loved, and thus, they too often wind up breaking.

Had England known what sort of fate was in store for Alfred if he were not granted his freedom? He wondered how spiteful England must have felt towards his once-colony for leaving, for _wanting_ to leave.

But Russia could never, ever hate him. How could he? America was water racing down a parched throat, a soothing splashing on a feverish child's skin, the magic that coaxed fragile sprouts out of their tiny dens and transformed them into strong stalks lifting cheerful yellow heads to the sunlight. America was water dancing as it twinkled, always moving about and rushing over mossy pebbles and making them gleam like gold and silver. America was the oasis in the desert, the place where so many wayward travelers hoped to call home and find relief.

America was also cruel and angry, so many millions of drops converging into a powerful wave, uncontainable, thundering, ugly and savage in a lovely sort of way. The corners of Ivan's mouth twitch ever so slightly, though it's still a long, unhappy line.

Not even after a hundred years of war and bitterness can England bring himself to hate America, to hate Alfred. Even when people spoke evil things about the country, the cornerstone of Capitalism, America was always dearly-loved.

_Love is all around you._

Within him, around him, America was so_ worthy_ of everyone's affection and admiration that Russia wondered why_ America's_ heart did not burst out of his chest.

_Your universe is FULL._

Yes, full, scattered with with busy, happy memories that were stars rather than snowflakes, filling up the darkness until the stars overtook everything; a blinding light in the universe.

_But in **my** world..._

_There is only **you**._

The sun was there, magnificent and glowing and all-consuming but the Earth was obsolete, just a frozen tundra of rocks in a desolate wasteland. Ivan buried his face in his hands and started to weep.

How ironic it was that they all called such a land home!

_~*oOo*~_

He hears the door burst open, and who else but America to rush in, smiling broadly. Ivan slowly turns around from the window as America spots his brown leather gloves lying at his vacant seat. He's somewhat wet; raindrops are shining in his straw hair like pearls.

"Whew!" exclaimed Alfred, seizing them. "Made it before closing...ah?" His blue eyes wandered over to the tall man in the corner, and he hastily starts stammering out an apology.

"I forgot-um, so sorry! I didn't mean..."

And then he gets a better look at the man, and sheepishness turns to confusion.

"Russia?" he asks curiously, stepping forward to meet the tortured-looking country as if he didn't believe his eyes. "Russia...?" he says again, and Russia doesn't say anything at all Alfred approaches, unusually tentative. "What are you doing here alone? The meeting was over awhile ago."

He catches sight of the tears rolling from Russia's dark eyes, looking at a loss. "Why are you...crying?" Ever the hero, Alfred carefully extends a hand out to Ivan, as if he were afraid the other nation would bite him.

Stricken, Russia just looks at him like a wild man, a child alone at a shopping mall.

"You..." _Of course it's you, how could it not be you, just standing there and looking so worried and small and **concerned**—_A small smile grows on the Russian's pale, pale face, as if he has heard a particularly good joke, though it is still clogged with pain.

Ivan clasps his hands together, as if in prayer. For a moment, his gaze falls on his interlocked fingertips, slowly lifting them apart as though they were the jaws of a steel trap.

"Do you know..." Ivan says at last, his hand rising to meet Alfred's, their fingers twining together. Russia doesn't hesitate to step closer, and before long, Ivan's arms slowly wrap around his torso, large hands brushing his back tenderly. "What you remind me of, Alfred?"

Alfred just stares at him, confused and uncomfortable as Russia's arms wrap around him, gentle and constricting serpents. This is far too strange for him, and he wants nothing more than to stagger back away from the awkward embrace. But Russia just looks so _miserable_, his eyes twisted with so much pain that Alfred doesn't know what to do. He hadn't remembered seeing his longtime rival look so utterly since the fall of the Soviet Union.

And even then there hadn't been so much _emptiness_ in his eyes. The least he can do is to hear him out. That was what heroes did, after all.

Russia's hands ghost to his own hands frozen in the air, twining themselves around them. Hot tears start rolling down his face, and Alfred tries to pull back so that he can wipe at them, but Russia is holding his hands too tightly, keeping him arrested against his front, which smells of tobacco, spirits, and firewood.

Russia tilts his head so that his forehead presses against America's, and Ivan breathes, soft as a butterfly's kiss:"Alfred...you...you remind me of the rain."

And Alfred just blinks, azure eyes flicking to the water streaming down the windows back to the ancient country clutching him.

"I remind you of the rain...Russia?" He squeaks out in confusion, roses starting to bloom in his cheeks as one of Russia's hands frees one of Alfred's, only to sneak into the shorter man's hair, wrapping around the strands. For a moment, the two only breathe in the painful passing seconds, and Russia starts speaking again.

_"Yes..."_ murmurs Russia, his voice hot in Alfred's ear, eyes wistful, smile content. He presses his face against America's pulse, and America shudders in surprise, pulse quickening rapidly as Russia's lips brush against the skin.

"The rain...rain is beautiful, Alfred."

The heat in his face turns into a dull smoldering, and Alfred doesn't know what to do but look towards the window, where raindrops are still streaming down it it like so many tears. Ivan doesn't seem to want to pull back, so he continues to whisper softly against Alfred's face, chin resting in the thick brown fur surrounding the shoulders of the bomber jacket.

"Consuming the sky," says Ivan quietly, his voice shuddering. "Rain may be light and playful..." His grip on Alfred tightened, and the blond nation tried not to wince, "Or harsh and brutal."

He pulls back to look at America, his dark indigo eyes bore into America's cerulean, tremendously sad, but resolved.

"Filling up Earth's darkest and most barren crevasses..." And for a moment, the two aren't in a meeting room in New York City, but in a cave full of ice, the very bottom of the sea. "_With life_."

The smallest of kisses to Alfred's collarbone. "Rain is everything," croaks the older nation, ironic smile from earlier disappeared.

"Alfred..." he says, in a voice that doesn't seem to belong to him, his hand tentatively brushing Alfred's cheek as the raindrops trickle from America's skin from his, pattering to the floor. Ivan's voice took on an almost savage edge in its sadness, improving to a husky rumble:

"It slips...it slips...so** easily** through our fingers…"

Alfred's hand ghosts on his own before Ivan leans forward.

"Always...through_ **MY **_fingers..."

And then it seems America knows what's coming, because he tries to stagger back, but even as America's hand presses against Russia's heart (if it's a bid for freedom, it's a weak one) and the younger tries to whip his hand away from Ivan's, the Slavic nation simply hoists it upwards as though the two were in some strange waltz, his lips hovering over Alfred's.

"I can't..." the grim specter vows as the tears started to trickle down the younger's face, "I **won't**...let you slip...through my fingers anymore. Alfred..."

_I'm...sorry._

And Russia is not Russia but Ivan, crushing his lips to Alfred's adoringly, not America's. And yes, those are Alfred's fingers twisting themselves in his scarf, Alfred's fingertips still in his.

"Shhh," the taller country murmured soothingly when they broke apart, Alfred's piercing eyes locked in his own.

"Don't be frightened, little Alfred. I would never hurt you." Alfred relaxes, and Ivan smiles at him.

And then, he forces a handkerchief over America's face. Alfred's eyes widen in panic and he tries to shove Russia away, but the purple-eyed man just holds the writhing nation closer, expression calm, almost impassive even when kind.

"нет, little one," murmurs Ivan gently, cradling the desperately thrashing nation even as he opened his mouth in a soundless scream; bad idea. "You must come with me now, d-da?"

Alfred's blue eyes rolled back in his head, and his body abruptly went limp in Ivan's arms. The nation hefts him up in his arms and makes a beeline for the back door, where a vehicle awaits.

For the first time in years, a genuine, sanguine smile graced his features.

~*oOo*~

_Like Rain it sounded till it curved  
And then I new 'twas Wind —  
It walked as wet as any Wave  
But swept as dry as sand —  
When it had pushed itself away  
To some remotest Plain_  
_It pulled the spigot from the Hills  
And let the Floods abroad." _-Emily Dickinson

* * *

**The end. I wanted to include poems from both Russian and American poets...it seemed appropriate. Insert your choice of ending for this story. :)  
**


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